Curb cock



- A. KURRE F eb, 5

CURB COCK Filed Nov. 6, 1922 WITH/858 ATTORNEYS Patented Feb. 5, 11924.

AUGUST KURBE, OF BROOKLYN, NEW YORK.

CURB COCK.

Application filed November 6, 1922. Serial No. 599,309.

To all whom it may concern:

Be it known that I, AUGUST KURRE, a citizen of the United States, and a resident of the city of New York, borough of Brooklyn, in the county of Kings and State of New York, have invented a new and Improved C-urb Cook, of which the following is a full, clear, and exact description.

This invention provides what may be termed a new article of manufacture, in that it discloses a novel and improved type of curb-cock or the like in which means are provided for storing a mass or collection of protective material, hereinafter called the lubricant, so as to surround the ordinarily exposed parts of the valve structure in the immediate neighborhood of the relatively movable surfaces of valve member and casing. and also preferably at other exposed parts of the valve structure. According to the present invention, such lubricant is preferably a fairly heavy grease, although, of course. any suitable material may be used, as glycerine, or a thinner grease, or an oil, or indeed. as stated, any suitable material adapted for the purpose in mind as hereinafter explained.

In the case of a curb-cock or house cock, where the valve member has a rotatable core or plug, it is a well appreciated fact that the places in which such cocks are commonly installed, often in a bed of earth, and generally in a damp locality, give rise to rapid corrosion and deterioration of the metal parts. Hard, thick layers of soil and corroded metal form a crustaceous shell around the exposed joints, of so adamant a character as absolutely to prevent turning of the valve member and so making the cock useless, after a very shortperiod following installation. I have discovered in this connection that a galvanic condition is apparently set up. or at least some other phenomenon occurs. whatever the explanation of the same may be. as a result of which, and possibly due to the porosity of the brass, bronze, or other metal or metals of which the parts are constructed. even the inner working portions of the cock become encrusted with foreign matter. and so hasten the time when the old cock must be discarded and a new one installed at considerable trouble and expense.

The protective material I have found satisfactory above indicated to attain the desired object of prolonging practically indefinitely the life of a cock, and to act as what may be termed an insulating blanket agalnst galvanic action or the phenomenon just mentioned, especially when also confined and packed against the entire or the major part of the exterior of the ordinarily exposed casing which surrounds the valve member and provides a valve seat for the latter. To the end just mentioned, a new type of curb-cock is provided according to the invention, at least in accordance with present preference, in which the ordinary casing is surrounded by a supplementary casing or outer wall spaced from the ordinary casing to create a chamber between the two casings within which may be confined the blanket or a part of the blanket of protective material.

Otherwise stated, the invention provides a new cock, whatever its purpose, including a rotatable valve member, a casing therefor, and a supplementary casing, whether cast from the same material as the ordinary casing, or whether made of the same or dissimilar material, the interior of which supplementary casing may be packed with the protective material; such supplementary casing, of course, preferably including a readily attachable and detachable closure, or a plurality of such closures, to insure proper confining of the protective material in its appointed location or locations exterior to the ordinary valve casing. In this latter connection, it will be understood that the parts are so arranged that the protective material will be confined to overlap the exposed edges of the working surfaces of the casing and of the co-acting working surfaces of the parts movable relative to such casing. As a result, such confining of the protective material will serve also incidentally to furnish a film of lubricant and anti-corrosion material on certain or all of said working surfaces. Thus, when the present invention is applied to a curb-cock, or any other cook, but especially one including the characteristic and heretofore known elements of a rotatable valve member. a casing therefor, a stem projecting beyond the casing and carried by the valve member for manually turning the latter, and means associated with the casing and the valve member for limiting axial movement of the latter in the casing, the means last mentioned All usually including a washer or washers and a nut or nuts mounted on the lower projecting threaded end of the valve member, the invention provides a supplementary casing carried by the cock and shaped to provide a chamber between the two casings for receiving a mass of the protective material and confining such mass in intimate contact with the exterior of the first-mentioned casing, and particularly so as to embed therein said washers and nuts or the like at the lower projecting end of the valve member, and also particularly to embed in the same or a similar mass thevalve member where the latter projects beyond the casing at the stem or upper end of the latter. Thus, whether or not the supplementary casing be provided as in part including said supplementary wall surrounding the ordinary cock casing,

the supplementary casing will include one or more end cups for the ordinary casing, preferably threaded thereon, and if one such supplementary casing element include an end cup for the stem-carrying end of the valve member, and the protective material be a lubricant, said end of the valve member will preferably be of circular cross-section, and said cup will have a circular opening adapted to fit the said end of the valve member so snugly as practically to preclude extrusion of the protective material on such opening but nevertheless to maintain the valve member always freely rotatable due to the seepage of a film of the material between the working surfaces of the ordinary casing and the valve member.

Another object of the invention is to provide means preferably including an element or elements embedded in the protective material for holding the valve member and the ordinary casing, preferably yieldingl away from a too intimate contact at al times, thereby to coact with the other elements of the invention in preventing, not only mechanical jamming of the parts, but the formation of a mass of crustaceous foreign matter on the working surfaces of the va ve member and its casing; since by the arrangement just described the film of protective material relative to such surfaces mentioned in the paragraph preceding is facilitated as to its seepage between such surfaces to form a protective as well as a lubricating sheet between the same.

The invention will be more clearly understood from Jthe following description, when taken in connection with the accompanying drawing, which shows, as illustrative examples of the invention, two preferable of the many possible embodiments of the invention.

In this drawing:

Fig. 1 is a side elevation of one embodiment partially broken away and partially in section;

Fig. 2 is an axial vertical section on line 2-2 of Fig. 1;

Fig. 3 is a transverse horizontal section on line 3-3 of Fig. 2; and

Fig. 4 is a view similar to Fig. 2, but showing a modification.

Similar reference characters refer to similar parts throughout the several views of the drawing.

Referring to Figs. 1, 2 and 3, a curb-cock of conventional shape and construction is illustrated, so far as the plug, core, or valve member 5 is concerned, and likewise in regard to the main port 5 and the supplementary drain canal 5 of said valve member, as well as in regard to a tubular casing wall 6 surrounding the valve member, the hollow house and street-line extensions 6 and 6 of said casing wall, the drain port 5 for draining the house line by way of drain canal 5 and port 5 when the valve member is turned through 90 to close the cook, the closure screw 7 for the drain port, the lower threaded end 5 for the valve member, the washer 8 and the nut 9 associated in the familiar way with said end of the valve member, the squared stem 10 and attaching screw 11 for securing the stem in upward projection above the valve member, the stop screw 12 radially set in the upper projecting part of the valve member, and the plurality of stops or shoulders 13 on the upper edge of the casing wall 6 to coact with said screw 12 in limiting a 90 fractional rotation of the valve member in one direction for opening the cock as shown in the drawing and in the opposite direction to close the cock.

A similar collection of familiar parts is shown in the construction of Fig. 4, the easwall 6 of which, however, being the on y member thereof given a specific reference character.

Now reverting to Figs. 1 to 3, to describe the special auxiliary parts provided by the present invention, as it is now preferred to be carried out. it will be seen that really a new casing for the valve member is provided, in that said casing includes, in addition to the ordinary casing wall 6, a second or supplementary tubular casing Wall, or wall member 6"; the annular chamber thereby created to be packed as illustrated with a collection of protective material 14.

The supplementary casing here employed includes further an upper cup 15 and a lower cup 16. Lower cup 16 is closed, while upper cup 15 has a central opening fitting with rather close snugness around the upper end of valve member 5. Each cup adjacent to its rim. is interiorly threaded as illustrated, while the opposite end portions of'casing wall 6 are similarly exteriorly threaded; whereby, upon packing each cup interior with a collection of protective material 1%,

the cups may be'screwed tight onto such casing wall, finally to complete the new construction as shown clearly in Figs. 1 and 2.

Means for holding the valve member and its washer 8 or equivalent from too intimate contact with the bottom edge of the inner conical working surface of casing wall 6 is provided, and may comprise simply! a metal helical spring 17 mounted on the valve member at its upper end as illustrated most clearly in Fig. 3 at 17* and having its lower end resting on the top of the stop 13 shown in Fig. 2, whereby on turning the valve member to move said stop away from screw 12, the lower end of the spring rides and presses against the top of said stop. It will be noted that said spring, with the cup 15 affixed, is embedded in the protective material packed within said cup. This results in an anti-corrosion protection for such parts and a beneficent agitation of the protective material sufiicient to force an additional supply of the latter between the conical exterior surface of the valve member and the matching interior surfaceof casing wall 6, each time the valve is operated.

Adverting now to Fig. 4, it will be seen that really a new casing for the valve memher is here also provided, in that said casing includes annular ribs or peripheral flanges .6 which may also be termed auxiliary wall members. Such auxiliary wall members lie above and below the lower and upper exteriorly threaded end portions of casing wall 6. On these threaded portions are mounted interiorly threaded upper and lower cups 15 and 16 precisely as described in connection with the construction of Fig. 1, each of which cups has packed therein a mass of protective material 14.

As previously indicated, the construction of Fig. 1 is the preferred manner of carrying out the invention, and it will thus be seen that I have provided a construction well calculated to attain the various ends and objects of the invention as hereinabove explained.

It should be noted particularly that the supplementary parts contributed by! the present invention, and especially the parts arrangement of the parts described without departing from the invention, and hence I do not limit myself to the precise details set forth, but consider myself at liberty to make such changes and alterations as fairly fall within the spirit and scope of the appended claim.

I claim:

In a cock having a rotatable valve memher, an all me'tal casing for the valve member having a valve seat for said member and also having fluid passage openings leading to said valve seat, a stem projecting beyond the casing and carried by the valve member for manually turning the latter, and allmetal means associated with the casing and the valve member for limiting endwise movement of the latter in the casing, the combination of means carried by the cock to retard chemical and electrolytic corrosion of the all-metal parts when the cock is used as an underground shut-ofi' said means including a supplementary all-metal casing partially permanently carried by the main casing and partially comprising an all-metal annular structure detachably carried by the cock, said supplementary casing having the parts thereof so shaped that when said annular structure is attached a chamber is provided between the two casings completely noncommunicant with said valve seat, and a collection of oleaginous material packed tight in said chamber, said chamber extending alon the main casing except where the latter is in erruptedby said openings.

* AUGUST KURRE. 

